Reaching new heights: How have Europeans grown so tall?

Timothy J Hatton, 9 May 2014The height of today’s populations cannot explain which factors matter for long-run trends in health and height. This column highlights the correlates of height in the past using a sample of British army soldiers from World War I. While the socioeconomic status of the household mattered, the local disease environment mattered even more. Better education and modest medical advances led to an improvement in average health, despite the war and depression.

Here is a picture of two professional athletes, both of whom are All-Stars in their respective sports. Kevin Durant is listed at 6'10". Jose Altuve of the Houston Astros is 5'6". He's the smallest player in Major League Baseball, but he's not that far off from the height of an average male human.

Alex Tabarrok links to some new research further establishing the conclusion that being tall makes people happy:

Urban economics studies the geographic distribution of economic activity. In most urban economic models, the reason that cities aren’t taller is that, per square meter of useable space, taller buildings cost more to physically make. (Supporting quotes below.) According to this usual theory, buildings only get taller when something else compensates for these costs, like a scarce ocean view, or higher land prices.

One of the most ubiquitous cognitive biases is overconfidence. As Daniel Kahneman writes:

Here is the abstract to a new paper by Angus Deaton and Raksha Arora.

Artist Nickolay Lamm created illustrations that compare the body measurements of the average middle-aged man from the United States, Japan, France, and the Netherlands. Not surprisingly, Americans are fat compared to other countries. An illustration of the average 30- to 39-year-old man from the United States, Japan, the Netherlands, and France are shown from left to right.